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The Kentish Town studio, which includes an ensuite WC, is converted from a single room in a terraced house. Its main room measures a not-so-ample 9ft by 8ft, slightly larger than the average 6ft by 8ft prison cell.

The Observer viewed the property, and its reporter, Donna Ferguson, says it boasts an inspiring view of a brick wall. Nevertheless, lettings agent Alex Marks told her it had received 50 to 60 enquiries from hopeful tenants.

It is just one of thousands of studio flats advertised for rent in the capital, where an apparently runaway housing market is reaching fever pitch, apparently detached from the situation across the rest of Britain.

The flat consists of a a bed jammed into a single room alongside a five square-foot kitchen

There is
now a gap of more than £200,000 between a property in the UK’s largest
city and elsewhere – where the average price of a home is just £185,478 -
after a record 25.8 per cent price increase in just a year.

Rents,
which link more closely to wages, have not even increased half as much -
10 per cent in a year, the Observer says. But the Kentish Town property
shows where things are going: less for more.

Authorities
have stepped in to stem some of the worst abuses. Last month, This Is
Money reported how a tiny London flat advertised at more than
£730-a-month was taken off the market after Islington Council stepped
in.

It
consisted of a a bed jammed into a single room alongside a five
square-foot kitchen. Announcing the ban, Cllr James Murray, the
Islington's executive member for housing, told BBC Newsbeat: 'This place
is a shoebox, not a flat.'

Cramped: The floorplan shows how small the property is, at just 8ft by 8ft

Tenants desperate for a home in a central location had been undeterred. The flat in a former council property had been successfully let out for £737-a-month days before the ruling.

Yet the law has virtually no provision to stop flats being let out because they are too small - the Islington flat was found to have breached planning laws.

Nyree Applegarth, a property litigation partner at Higgs & Sons law firm, told the Observer : 'Under the Landlord and Tenants Act 1985, any property let by a landlord on an assured shorthold tenancy must be "habitable".

'That means it must be sanitary, clean and a fit place to live - but there's no requirement about space.'

The street in Kentish Town. It is just one of thousands of studio flats advertised for rent in the capital, where an apparently runaway housing market is reaching fever pitch

Britain now has the smallest new flats in western Europe, according to the Royal Institute of British Architects.

It launched a campaign last year calling for an end to 'rabbit hutch Britain' and saying the average new one-bedroom flat is now smaller than a Tube carriage.

But as a carriage on the Jubilee line is a princely 495 square feet, most of those pictured in this article are likely to be far smaller than that. And that size is still 100 square feet larger than the minimum size of a one-bed flat recommended by the Greater London Authority.

Grand Designs presenter Kevin McCloud fronted the campaign, saying: 'This isn't rocket science. We all instinctively respond to the opportunity for a view, a connection with the outdoors, fresh air, light and space.

'A return to minimum space standards is crucial for the health and wellbeing of the people who will be living in new build homes.'

But Mr McCloud's comments, almost a year ago, came before yet another surge in London house prices.

Many renters have no choice but to take
the first place they can afford, whether they are in poor condition or
far too small for them and their families...

The Office for National Statistics said a typical home in the capital is worth £459,000, 24.8 per cent more than in January 2008.

It is not only flats that are up for grabs. In April a ramshackle building next to an industrial estate in south London, whose most prominent use was to park the Mayor of Southwark's car, sold at auction for £550,000 after a bidding war - three times its estimate.

Parking spaces have also boomed in price, with a single space offered in a car park under the Royal Albert Hall in Kensington, west London, for £400,000.

Speaking about the surge in expensive studio flats to let across the capital, Roger Harding, campaigns director for the homeless charity Shelter, told MailOnline last month: 'The huge cost of private rents in the capital and tough competition for homes means that many renters have no choice but to take the first place they can afford, whether they are in poor condition or far too small for them and their families.

'The Mayor needs to get serious about building the affordable homes we desperately need, or times will keep getting tougher for generation rent.'